Monday, June 15, 2015

I planned to write a post last night, but after dinner I got wound up in an organizational frenzy. Things went downhill when I reached the linen closet and discovered a sample of Aveeno Positively Radiant Daily Moisturizer. Even though I have used Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel on my face every single morning and night for twelve years, I foolishly decided to switch things up and take the free sample for a test drive.

I washed and moisturized my face immediately because how is a girl supposed to go one more second knowing she's not as positively radiant as she could be?

Seconds later, my eyes and face were burning with the heat of a thousand suns and no matter what I tried, the pain would not subside. I took out my contacts and washed my face repeatedly with the gentlest cleanser I could find and even switched out my washcloth and towel. Nothing worked.

I finally ventured out to the living room with my eyes open a teeny tiny bit to tell Matt his optically compromised wife was going to bed, and this was on the TV.

AND THEN I FAINTED.

Just kidding.

Fear not, Matt's not toying with the idea of entering the dental field. He had an appointment for a dental implant scheduled for this morning and wanted to prepare himself for what was to come.

I am a girl who once fainted at the dentist office after getting a cavity filled.

And the morning after I got my wisdom teeth removed, I went into the bathroom to rinse with salt water and when I saw my very swollen cheeks in the mirror, I hit the floor.

So, since I don't do well with gruesome dental details, I got in bed. Matt came in when the implant video was over and when he asked if I needed anything, I requested that he hold the small fan I keep on my nightstand up to my eyes because that was the only way I could feel some relief.

Luckily I woke up today and my eyeballs had cooled way down to normal temperature. But Aveeno Positively Radiant Daily Moisturizer is forever dead to me.

Matt and I both had the day off today, and he was hurting big time after his dental implant appointment. He was describing the intensity of the pain to me and I stopped just short of saying "BUCK UP COWBOY, I HAD A BAD EXPERIENCE WITH A POSITIVELY RADIANT MOISTURIZER LAST NIGHT, SO I KNOW PAIN," because something tells me having a giant piece of metal screwed into your jawbone is probably a little bit more painful and also, not done purely in the name of vanity.

So I made sure he had a steady supply of ice packs and jello and that he took his medicine and then I made a trip to Sonic to get him a milkshake because HE HELD A FAN UP TO MY EYES last night as I fell asleep and I thought that was a debt I should attempt to repay.

Wednesday, June 10, 2015

On Saturday, Matt volunteered at a carnival sponsored by our local hospital. He volunteers every year and it's one of his favorite events of the summer. I pretty much do all I can to avoid carnivals, but Matt works in that pretzel and soda tent like a boss and loves every minute.

This year there was a new addition to his tent's menu- half a lemon with a candy lemon stick in it. The point is to suck the lemon juice through the candy stick like a straw, because what's more refreshing than a tablespoon of sour lemon juice on a hot day?

Matt's only complaint about the carnival this year was that dissatisfied customers who purchased the refreshing lemony treat kept returning to the tent to ask for refunds because they couldn't get their lemon juice to suck through the stick.

And that right there is why I don't volunteer at carnivals.

While Matt was busy volunteering, I went with Michelle to babysit her five month old niece. Things went well for the first hour, and by that I mean we watched her play on her activity mat and blow raspberries while we ate chips and salsa.

And then it was time for the Belmont Stakes, so we stuck the baby in her jumper seat so we could focus on American Pharoah's pursuit of the Triple Crown while discussing whether a good horse or a good jockey is the more important key to success.

This might lead you to believe that we are major horse racing fans but I can assure you that we are not, but you can count on us to jump on a bandwagon.

Excitement grew when Michelle's dad, who was at the race, texted her to report that he was sitting next to American Pharoah's owner. We kept an eagle eye on the owner and his purple tinted glasses every time he was on the screen in hopes of catching a glimpse of Mr. C.

And then after we yelled and cheered and screamed during the race, the camera panned to the white haired man we'd been paying such close attention to, and the caption on the screen said, "Bob Baffert, American Pharoah's trainer."

Well shoot. We were looking at the wrong guy the whole time.

After the race, Michelle said, "Want to take the baby for a walk?"

"Sure," I said, and we plopped her in the stroller and off we went. After about twenty minutes, when the poor thing was squinting because the sun was in her eyes, Michelle said, "Do you think we should have put sunscreen on her?"

"Maybe," I said. "And do you think we should have brought...something?"

Because do you know what we left the house with?

The baby.

And nothing else.

No blanket or pacifier or burp cloth or rattle because clearly we are two girls who are not accustomed to thinking of the potential needs of a small child.

We strolled back to the house and put the baby in her pajamas, which turned out to be a two man job. She went to sleep without a peep and we came downstairs, turned on My Best Friend's Wedding, and cheersed our wine glasses to a job well done.

Michelle might have even said, "We are like EXPERT parents," and I think I called us baby whisperers.

And then at 10:00 the baby woke up and was NOT HAPPY so we changed her and fed her and explained to her that sleep was really the best thing for her. When that didn't work we laid her down on the activity mat to try to tire her out. Unfortunately that made her more active, so we quickly nixed that plan and instead brought the stroller inside, pulled up all the hoods so she couldn't see anything, and pushed her round the living room.

SHE DID NOT FALL FOR THAT TRICK EITHER.

We'd been beaten by a five month old.

Eventually she did drift back to sleep, and we determined that she must have woken up earlier because she'd had a bad dream. She was in a clean outfit, had just eaten, and was snuggled up in her crib with the fan blowing lightly in her direction and the sound machine turned on.

I could sleep for a solid twelve, thirteen hours under those conditions.

So, naturally, a bad dream was the only thing that could've caused the disruption. I bet she was dreaming about being taken out into the world by two inexperienced caregivers who didn't even give a second thought to bringing any sort of baby supply.

Tuesday, June 9, 2015

My friend Jenna is getting married in August and I am a bridesmaid in her wedding.

Jenna is my oldest friend. We went to kindergarten together and have been friends ever since, which makes that 22 years of friendship. Jenna lives in Boston now, but she was home for the weekend and I went to her house on Sunday to see her veil and look at bridal hairstyles on Pinterest and help her assemble her wedding invitations.

We worked on wedding tasks for a few hours and then her parents ordered us pizza and we sat at her kitchen table eating our pizza and brownies for dessert while her dad made corny jokes and her mom refilled our lemonade. It almost felt like we traveled back in time to sixth grade instead of being grown ups who live on our own and have real jobs and were talking about her WEDDING.

Jenna's shower was last month, and the night before I went through my box of mementos from my own bridal shower last year, and came across the slideshow that was played. There were pictures of me and Matt and then pictures of the two of us. That night Matt and I watched the DVD together and by the way we oohed and aahed over our childhood adorableness I almost looked into upgrading to a two bedroom apartment to accommodate our egos.

Although, let's be honest, you'd be hard pressed to find kids cuter than the two of us.

But perhaps the most entertaining pictures were the photos of me between the ages of about three and five. Those were the years that I desperately wanted long hair, but what I had was this adorable little bowl cut.

And so in lieu of actual hair, I wore a pink baby nightgown on my head. All. The. Time. And I called it "my hair" without even a hint of irony.

As in, "Are you ready to eat breakfast Laura?"

"One minute Mom, just putting on my shoes and my hair."

And my mom would style my nightgown-hair every morning in various styles per my request. Some days I would wear it "all down," but my favorites were "up on both sides" and a "high ponytail." My mom was even able to rig up pig tails by twisting the nightgown on my head and putting the arms in one pigtail and the body in the other.

Thursday, June 4, 2015

As a follow up to my last post, I will share that I went back to the mall this weekend and bought a few more things for my work wardrobe, including a black skirt.

Actually, two black skirts.

Okay, actually three black skirts.

Apparently I'm trying to create some sort of uniform for myself.

This morning I put on the fanciest of the skirts because I had a new employee starting and I wanted to look like a boss.

Usually I get flowers for new employee's desks, but since this particular employee was a man and I wasn't sure how he'd feel about a vase of daisies, I decided to pick up some donuts instead.

I stopped by Dunkin' Donuts and was about ten minutes into my commute when I glanced down and saw a gigantic rip right in the front of my new skirt. And then I sat at a red light and contemplated whether or not I could keep a file folder strategically positioned over my right thigh all day without looking like a nut. In the end I decided that I couldn't, so I went home to change into a pair of pants. And I considered grabbing an extra outfit to just keep in my trunk in case I ever need spare clothes in the future.

My pants and I made it to the office in record time. I had to set up the new employee's user account and he needed to add numbers to the end. He said, "I'll just use my birthday. July eighth, nineteen NINETY TWO.

Someone born in 1992 is old enough to be a grown up and have a real job.

And I was born in 1988 and am considering keeping a spare outfit in my trunk.

Age is just a number.

Speaking of jobs, Matt works for a huge law firm and his boss told him that he'd have to go to University of Pennsylvania's law school a few days this week to answer any questions new law students might have about technology. Matt anticipated the question pool to be pretty shallow and was geared up for a week on easy street. He even considered bringing a few issues of American Hunter in case he had some down time.

And then he walked into the meeting on Monday and one of the firm's top partners said, "Now everyone, make sure to utilize your trial master, Matt."

MATT THE TRIAL MASTER.

It turns out his boss didn't give him the full story, and he was assigned to be working at the firm's trial academy for incoming associates from around the nation. The first day's mock trial had quite an impact on him and he's now contemplating law school.

He also sent me this text on his way home.

He held true to his promise because when he got home tonight he had a bag with half a dozen donuts in hand.

It was good to start the evening on a high note because after dinner we had to complete my open enrollment insurance information.

Insurance is not my wheelhouse. For example, when I got my first real job I brought the insurance information home for my dad to look at and said, "I didn't look at it too closely but they have a cafeteria plan! Can you believe it?" Because I thought a cafeteria plan meant lunch every day. And that I'd hit the jackpot.

And then my dad broke the news that this is the real world and a cafeteria plan is a type of health insurance plan. MAJOR BUMMER.

The insurance torch has now been passed to Matt. I think in our marriage vows we should have said, "I promise to love you in good times and in open enrollment."

In the last few months I had a full eye exam and ordered six months worth of contact lenses. When I made the appointments Matt asked if I used my vision insurance and I said no, because I didn't get vision insurance last year.

We logged into my benefits accounts tonight and Matt said "Let's check exactly what insurance you had last year so we can compare."

Guess who got vision insurance last year.

Whoops.

HAVE A DONUT MATT, AND REMEMBER HOW HAPPY YOU WERE TWO MINUTES AGO.

Luckily I still have my current insurance through the end of the month, so guess who will be getting a brand new pair of glasses next week?

I'm hoping that my vision will be better than ever. Maybe it will so clear that I will notice a rip in my skirt before I leave the house.

Monday, June 1, 2015

Well, last week was only a three day week for me, but it was quite a doozy in the work department. Evidently my mind couldn't even relax at night because I had TWO crazy dreams that I will now share since who doesn't love to hear about other people's dreams?

Oh that's right.

Probably nobody.

But nevertheless, the main characters in dream number one were my brother and sister-in-law, who really and truly are expecting a baby in August. They're not finding out the gender, but they have names picked out which I won't share because I'm not sure if they want them blasted on the World Wide Web. But trust me, they're adorable.

In my dream, the baby was born and my entire extended family was at my aunt's house, so the new parents brought the baby over to meet everyone after they left the hospital.

And when they arrived the baby was covered up in pink AND blue blankets because OH THE SUSPENSE IS NEVER ENDING. When they finally unwrapped the baby, she had a tiny pink bow in her hair and I said to my sister in law, "It's a girl!! Did you end up naming her ______?"

And she said, "No. We actually named her.....Wendy."

WENDY?"It wasn't even on our list," she said, "but I heard it the other day and just absolutely fell in love with it."
Luckily a text the next morning confirmed that Wendy is not a contender, so crisis averted.

The next night, I dreamed that I was attending college in Hawaii, and I walked through the student union building one day and saw a large crowd gathered. Everyone was lined up to catch a flight back to the mainland because a storm was coming, so I bought a plane ticket and hightailed it home to Pennsylvania.

Upon arrival in Philadelphia, I made my way to baggage claim to pick up my suitcase. But instead of a suitcase waiting for me at baggage claim, there were 47 trays of fresh baked bread with my name on them.

HAD I LANDED IN PENNSYLVANIA OR HEAVEN?

I couldn't fit all of the bread in my rental car, and unfortunately just when I was about to find out how many loaves I could jam in the trunk, I woke up.

After two bad dreams and two bad days, I decided that I needed some new work clothes since I felt like I was looking like a ragamuffin and also still wearing the same pants I got for my first job after college. The job where I had to deliver morning announcements over the office wide speaker system, and kick them off by playing a little tune on a Fisher Price guitar into the speaker of the phone. #EnglishMajor

The pants were Starlight brand from JCPenney's junior department and while they had served me well for five years, they were beginning to feel, and look, like sweatpants.

So, on Thursday I went to the mall right after work. I was a woman on a mission. Three hours later I waved the white flag and accepted that my mission wasn't as productive as I'd hoped it would be. However, it wasn't a total loss because I did get a nice pair of "Hey I'm 26 now, and I have an office and the authority to sign off on expense reports" pants.

And I put those bad boys on Friday morning with a new blouse that I tucked in because look at me! I'm professional! You can count on me to make a decision of minimal to moderate importance!

And when I went to the restroom at lunch, I discovered this on my pants.